


A Moment To Breathe

by winterwatercolour



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Asthma, Chest infections, Lance has a bad immune system, Langst, M/M, Sickfic, also keith is really guilty, and has a huge crush on lance lol, and hides it so his friends cant help him, basically lance is a bit of a goofball but we love him, contagion, lance downgrades the extent of his illness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-11
Updated: 2017-08-11
Packaged: 2018-12-14 05:39:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,366
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11776617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/winterwatercolour/pseuds/winterwatercolour
Summary: A minor cold passes through Team Voltron and Lance gets it last, but he's asthmatic and gets hit with it a lot harder than the rest of the crew. He doesn't want to make a big deal out of it because everyone is tired and busy, but it really wasn't a good idea in the slightest.





	A Moment To Breathe

**Author's Note:**

> So this was a prompt fill on my tumblr! I liked how this turned out kinda so have it lmao also im a n00b to Voltron so bare with me as I try to get a feel for these characters!! 
> 
> Here was the direct prompt if you want!:
> 
> Hi! Could u write a fic where Lance is asthmatic and catches a cold that's been passed through the team? They got over it quickly, but it hits Lance really hard. Everyone thinks he's exaggerating for sympathy so they ignore him. Lance tries to take care of himself but it turns into a bad chest infection. When he shows up to a meeting all feverish and wheezy and coughing nonstop, the team finally realize something's wrong

Lance’s space adventures taught him many things, but one of the many things he had definitely learnt was that he didn’t know a lot of things. The universe was far more vast, diverse and complicated than he could ever had fathomed, and at times Lance questioned everything he once knew.

One thing he still knew for sure, is that he was extremely adaptable.

If Lance was part of the X Men (which in his opinion, was just as cool as flying a robotic lion), he was definitely Darwin. He adjusted pretty well to the Garrison, despite being many miles away from the family he loved very deeply. Things were constantly tossed and yanked away from him, and he bounced back pretty quick.

It wasn’t easy, definitely, but Lance worked hard and put a 100% in everything he did. Of course he still felt he wasn’t good enough, and that he could work into being more, but he could be slightly assured that what he had done was all he could have in that moment in time. It was one of the only things he prided himself in and held dear to his identity.

Lance constantly had a flaming passion, this fiery desire burning in his heart to be a hero and to do good for others. He wanted to look out for the little guy, inspired by his young nephews and nieces to be the guy that people wanted to look up to. Hope that people would turn to in the darkest of times. He had promised his family he would always be protecting them from harm, and he vowed to himself to do all in his power to do so.

But of course, he had to work through trials and tribulations. Life was not easy, and not everything he wanted could necessarily be what he got, but he’d try.

One of the obstacles he faced in his journey was asthma.

He’d had it for as long as he could remember, and it was a irritating when it interrupted his daily life, but since he’d always had it it was pretty normal for him. Sure, it weakened his immune system, made illnesses hit him a little harder than the average, make him carry around inhalers everywhere and be a little more careful and cautious than everyone else, but Lance would not let it get in the way of his dreams and not let it hold him back from doing what he wanted.

His family knew what triggered it the most, kept the house clean constantly, carried around inhalers themselves just in case Lance forgot, and always remembered to replace inhalers. When he moved to the Garrison, Hunk became like his family and was the only one who knew about it, but he was more than enough. Hunk helped him when he had attacks, taking it upon himself to educate himself more so he could give Lance a hand. With someone as lovely as Hunk by his side, it was a minor inconvenience, at most.

It was indeed proven as a minor inconvenience when a small cold spread across the five Paladins.

It had started with Pidge, who had passed it onto Hunk, who had passed it to Shiro, who passed it to Keith.

At most it was only a very slight fever topped with a few coughing and sneezing fits, increased drowsiness and fatigue, scratchy throats. The Paladins were grumpy and exhausted, but it wasn’t anything to be worried about. It was such a minor inconvenience to the team that Hunk was sent on a solo mission by the time Keith received the cold.

Despite the fact that the cold was so minor and something that could have been cured with a day to twos rest and some soup, Lance took it upon himself to take care of Keith. He checked up on him every hour, forgetting that he had a weaker immune system. Of course, Lance was last to receive the virus. On the day Hunk left for the solo mission, no less.

* * *

Lance woke up feeling extremely groggy and weak to the bone, intense heat radiating off his body, but yet trembling with the cold. He barely managed to open his eyes, which were heavy and burning slightly, but his vision managed to focus enough for him to check his clock. He had five minutes before his alarm would go off.

Lance let out a delighted, but tired noise and shut his eyes, pulling the blankets tight against his skin so he could insulate his body heat. He snuggled against one of his pillows and was lulled back to sleep in record breaking time.

However his five minute sleep had lasted far longer than he had expected.

When Lance finally woke up again, he woke to an obviously loud ringing of his alarm. He hissed at the irritating, headache inducing sound and sat up groggily, rubbing at his aching temple. His eyes scanned over to his alarm clock and froze as he realised it was a whole 25 minutes after his regular waking time.

Lance gasped softly, about to throw himself off bed when he began to cough violently. The sound that released from his lungs awfully congested and phlegmy, causing a light wheeze to sound out from his chest. He gasped for air, managing to cough enough so he wouldn’t choke.

Lance breathed in heavily, getting out of bed and quickly changing into his clothes before running out of his bedroom, despite his lungs begging and pleading for him to stop. They were still recovering from his past fit, and needed a bit of time to recover from it and certainly did not appreciate Lance’s sprinting.

Lance tried to ignore the thought in his head that was telling him none of the other Paladins cough’s sounded that horrible.

* * *

“Nice of you to join us,” Keith commented, not looking up as he heard the door sliding open.

Lance opened his mouth, probably about to shoot back a snide remark but instead, took a sharp inhale and sneezed ticklishly twice.

Shiro frowned, giving Lance a sympathetic smile, “I guess you weren’t immune to this after all.”

Lance rubbed his nose on his sleeve weakly, shaking his head, “Im fine, just a morning snee–”

He cut himself off with two more forceful, congested sneezes.

Keith looked over at Lance, a look of guilt momentarily washing over his features. He looked away defensively, curling up within himself in what seemed to be shame, “C-cover your mouth when you sneeze, Lance.”

Lance rolled his eyes, too tired to respond to Keith so sat down on one of the couches. He looked glum and exhausted, curling up, shivering ever so slightly.

“Oh c'mon Keith, cut him some slack, he’s sneezing because he looked after you,” Pidge insisted, focused on something on her computer.

Keith flushed, crossing his arms and refusing to meet Lance’s eyes, defensive and guilty, “I didn’t ask for him to look after me!”

When Lance didn’t respond, only coughing harshly into his sleeve, the sound awfully chesty and wet, Keith felt even worse.

“L-look, Lance, it was nice and stuff, but it was stupid. I didn’t need the help,” Keith said, completely flustered.

Shiro sighed, “What’s done is done. Lance is sick now. Nothing we can do about that.”

“You’ll get over it in like a day, Lance, you’ll be fine. Honestly, it’s not anything worth fussing over. You don’t even have to stay in bed or anything, so I wouldn’t worry or anything,” Pidge reassured, looking up at Lance kindly.

Lance offered a small, weak smile back at her. He couldn’t quite shake the feeling that she was wrong. As the seconds went by he became even more convinced that Pidge was in fact very wrong, and that this wasn’t something that would fly by easily.

His chest felt extremely heavy, and there was a blockage in his airways that made it hard to breathe. He could practically feel some congestion and mucus building up inside him, a light wheeze every time he exhaled.

Lance coughed harshly again, his chest burning with a fiery blaze every time he did. His entire body was racked by his coughing, tears streaming down his eyes as he continued to mercilessly hack. He let out one final, strangled cough and slumped back against the couch, head spinning in circles as the world rotated violently. He breathed in heavily, basically gasping for air as his body desperately replenished itself with much needed oxygen.

Pidge was undeniably one of the most intelligent people Lance knew, but in this moment he was certain she was wrong. This was not going to be a good day.

* * *

Everyone was pretty easy on Lance that day, assigning him simple jobs while the rest of them continued to navigate and intensely plan away. It was a pretty easy-going, laid back da for him, but even the simplest, most easy jobs took a toll on Lance.

In fact Lance was extremely frustrated, because most of the Paladins had been able to do simple jobs easily while they were ill. Why couldn’t he?

He knew it was because of the asthma messing up his lungs, but he was frustrated nonetheless.

His chest felt extremely heavy, his wheezing even more noticeable as the day went on. He started to feel stifled and restrained, as if someone was squeezing at his chest and preventing him from breathing. It was so difficult to breathe at a steady pace and his body was not receiving the amount of oxygen that it needed. He felt completely drained and void of energy, head furiously pounding. He felt extremely faint, nauseous and weak. Not to mention warm yet freezing with a fever that had began to worsen.

Allura was explaining a mission that they were expecting to take on soon to Lance a rather simple one, but Lance could not hear her at all. He felt too sapped and drained that his body simply was no longer functioning.

“Lance, do you hear me?” She asked, very convinced that he hadn’t.

Lance sniffled softly, trying to keep his drooping lids open as he let out yet another cough, and croaked, “Sorry, princess, I didn’t.”

Allura sighed in exasperation, clearly exhausted by today, having exerted herself because they were short one and a half Paladins, “I have to explain again.”

Lance looked genuinely guilty, his voice raspy and sounding like his vocal chords had just been viciously burned and strangled, speaking straining his throat greatly, like a dagger slicing his throat as he spoke, “Im sorry. I just feel really sick.”

Shiro sighed softly, “We know Lance.”

Lance frowned, feeling a little off and extra sensitive from his fever, curling up in his seat pathetically as he shivered violently, “I  feel so awful..this really sucks you guys..”

Pidge spared him a glance, genuinely feeling really sorry for him but feeling a little cranky from the intensity of today, “Yeah Lance, it really does, we all know. We had it. It really isn’t so bad, i promise.”

Keith nodded, “We are sorry Lance, but we do need to continue on and work. We don’t have time for this at the moment. We really need to focus on this right now.”

Lance felt a pang in his heart, his entire demeanour declining. He nodded guiltily, his fever heightening his sensitivity. Realistically, the Paladins and he were just seriously misunderstanding and didn’t mean to be dismissive. Hell, if they knew Lance had asthma and felt this sick none of them would ever act like this, but Lance’s fever made him extra sensitive so he withdrew and hid away.

* * *

Lance overexerted himself the next few days, trying to work to an efficient standard to the best of his ability. He tried to push past his illness and elect to ignore it, ignoring the inclining fever and how the wheezing had intensified every time he breathed. He tried to ignore the violent coughing fits that completely took over him, the congested hacking that had him buckling at the knees and shaking violently, and the phlegm he had to spit out and the strange colour, and the odd discolouration.

His friends had helped, bringing him blankets when he worked and making him herbal tea, sending him off to bed earlier than the rest of them, excusing him from training and the like. But Lance downgraded the true extent of his illness, but the Paladins were a little wary of the fact Lance was sick longer than they had. For the most part he took care of himself, discreetly taking his inhaler when no one was looking and taking medicine to himself, making himself soup and drinking lots of water.

Lance kept his symptoms bottled up, ignoring how his chest felt like it was on fire and how his entire body became ablaze with pain every time he coughed. His chest felt tight and restricted his breathing, leaving him in a constant faint state, leaving him detached and derealised from his reality and friends. He didn’t even feel like a real person.

All this kept building up, until his bottle couldn’t handle anymore material and it eventually burst.

Everything came crashing down on the day Hunk returned. Everyone had come to greet him as the yellow lion mounted back onto the Castle, save for Lance.

He hadn’t even heard Coran announcing Hunk’s return, simply engulfed by his blazing fever as he struggled to get out of bed, fiercely sweating into his sheets and trying to find the willpower to get out of bed. His head hurt with such an enormous intensity that he wanted to cry out with how much it hurt. He’d clenched his teeth so tightly to try and subside the pain, desperately clawing at his head to try and stop the gnawing hurt in his head.

He then heard speaking over the intercom calling him for a meeting, and somehow Lance mustered the last slivers of his strength to get out of his bed. As he did the world spun violently, like he was on an intense amusement park ride. He groaned as he tried to keep himself from falling, as every time he walked he was shaking, knees threatening to buckle and give out on him. Lance pulled his jacket on and zipped it up, pulling his sleeves over his hands to mask as gloves.

As he staggered over to the bridge, his chest felt incredibly tight and constricted, feeling suffocated and smothered. He could barely breathe, his breathing so short and shallow only a minuscule amount of oxygen could enter his body at a time, leaving him feel very faint and weak. He could hear a loud wheezing from his chest as sweat dripped down his face.

Lance didn’t know how he made it to the Bridge, but he did. The doors slid open and Hunk beamed.

“Lance! I–” Hunk’s face dropped, his face growing into extreme worry in a millisecond as he gasped.

“Oh my god Lance!” He yelped, rushing towards his side.

Everyone else aboard whipped their heads around to see the commotion, all their mouths dropping open as they took in Lance’s ghastly appearance. He was horribly pale, dark circles underneath his eyes and he shivered intensely, looking like a zombie from those films that Lance very much loved. But as much as Lance enjoyed good zombie media, they all knew Lance didn’t want to become one.

“Oh my god!” Pidge exclaimed in shock, completely frozen in place, genuinely scared that her dear friend was dying.

“Lance!” Shiro yelled, angry that all this had happened under his nose.

Hunk pressed the back of his hand against Lance’s cheek, eyes widening at the intense heat coming off it. His concern was only further worsened as he began to hear wheezing coming from Lance.

Lance began to cough violently, entire frame taken over and racked with the congested, strangled explosions. His vocal chords strained each time he coughed, muscles being pulled fiercely and mercilessly. The extravaganza of the whole ordeal had Lance’s legs giving out on him, leeching him off the tiniest sliver of energy remained in him. He could no longer support himself, knees buckling and soon enough he was on the floor, continuing to hack his lungs out.

Everyone was frozen, completely stunned and at shock.

Suddenly, a strangled yell sounded out.

“Well don’t just stand there!” Keith yelled, running towards Lance and hitting his back, while Hunk sprinted for an inhaler, Shiro running for a glass of water and the remaining three running to prepare medicine and the medbay.

Keith kneeled down to Lance and rubbed his back as he continued to cough, whispering reassuring, soft words into his ear. His freehand stroked through Lance’s brown hair soothingly and reassuringly.

Lance spit out some phlegm, slightly tinged with a bit of blood.

“Oh Lance..” Keith muttered worriedly, letting Lance exhaustedly rest his head on his shoulder, breathing heavily and gasping for air.

“You’re going to be okay, buddy, I promise you, just hang on a little bit,” Keith whispered soothingly, continuing to twiddle with his hair.

Hunk burst back into the room and pressed the inhaler to Lance’s lips, watching as the boy visibly relaxed as the medicine entered his system.

“I didn’t know he was..” Keith said guilty.

Hunk smiled at him kindly and placed a hand on his shoulder, “Well know you know.”

Shiro returned with a glass of water, which Lance gulped down gratefully.

Soon enough, Pidge had returned.

“The medbay is ready for him now, do you guys know what’s wrong?” She said worriedly.

“I think it’s a chest infection,” Hunk said worriedly.

Shiro gave them all a reassuring look, “He will be just fine, Lance is tough.”

Keith didn’t look too convinced, still clearly shaken, but managed to stand up and pick Lance up into his arms, cradling him gently, beginning to walk towards Medbay.

“Keith?” Lance slurred feverishly.

“Yes?” Keith said shakily.

“I feel a little sick.”

Keith couldn’t help the shaky smile creeping onto his lips, “Solid observation, there, buddy.”

* * *

Lance woke up a few hours later, feeling a lot better but still a little out of it and generally unwell.

His eyes focused enough so that he could see Keith sitting down on a chair next to him, lightly nodding off.

“Keith?” Lance croaked out.

Keith woke instantaneously, unable to hide how his face lit up when he saw Lance awake. He couldn’t help the soft smile spreading across his lips.

“Oh god, Lance, you’re okay,” Keith breathed out.

Lance managed a husky chuckle, “Yeah, I guess dude.”

Keith’s face darkened slightly, “I’m so sorry.”

Lance’s face scrunched in confusion, “Huh?”

“..This is all my fault.”

“What are you talking about?”

Keith looked away guiltily, biting at his lip, “..You got sick because of me. You’re here because of me, and I didn’t even notice you became so bad.”

There was a long silence, and tears began to prick at Keith’s eyes.

“Hey man,” Lance pressed, “Stop this emo crap. I wanted to take care of you. I care about you, in case you didn’t know. I knew there were consequences, but I made a choice and I still stand by it.”

Keith chuckled shakily, looking up at Lance and unable to stop himself from grinning ear to ear. It was a good look on him.

Suddenly Keith leaned in and pressed a kiss against Lance’s lips, a spark of passion igniting in his body. He felt a mix of the cozy warmth of a fire on a cold winter’s night, and the cool summer breeze against his hair on a hot summer’s day. Keith felt firm, but yet sweet and soft, loving. The perfect combination of fire and ice.

Keith pulled away, despite Lance wishing against everything he never would, blushing hard, “I’m sorry.”

Lance smirked, “For what?”

“I don’t really know,” Keith giggled.

Keith tried to suppress the dorky grin spreading across his features, rubbing his neck, “Uh, I should tell the others you’re awake..um..let’s not tell anyone about this..for now, okay?”

Lance giggled, “Okay.”

They would all find out eventually.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm also not asthmatic so please forgive me for medical inaccuracies! Hope this was ok <33


End file.
